


Old Flames and Toughened Scars

by sp00kworm



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Drabble, Exploration Piece, M/M, One Shot, Violence, warm up piece
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-02 08:45:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18807727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sp00kworm/pseuds/sp00kworm
Summary: Reaper and Soldier 76 are not who they used to be. Reaper's persona is an excuse to become the monster. Soldier 76 a vigilante hero. But, can they come to an agreement about the past, or will old wounds forever bleed?





	Old Flames and Toughened Scars

The two of them were heaving as they looked at one another. Jack’s visor was cracked along his left eye, distorting the text that rolled along the bottom left corner and disrupted the tracking system he relied on a little too heavily these days. Instead of speaking, he was quickly pushing himself upwards, tossing his visor away to clatter Reaper around the face. The mask stayed clipped in place, but he heard the rush of air from the man’s mouth as he nose was snapped beneath the piece. Vindictively, he hoped it hurt, and he hoped the man in front of him was bleeding. Their weapons had been dropped long ago, out of bullets and tricks to throw at one another, they’d taken to throwing punches and throwing one another, around like it was a good fifteen years earlier. 

The punch had caught Reaper off guard, and Jack laughed bitterly, his scarred face contorted with resentment as he watched blood drip down the underneath the mask. It melted away too fast. He had clung to the anger for years now, maybe less so than the man before him, but it had stopped him from being nice. Now he was stood, breathless and bruised before the man he once had called his best friend, and lover, it melted into nothing but bitterness.   
“I hope that fucking hurt.” He growled as he watched the smoke curl around Reaper’s leg armour and peel away from his exposed arms. The tops were wrapped with tight black tape. Jack knew why after he’d blown some off. The man’s right arm was exposed underneath them, the gaping cuts under them open and oozing more of the dreaded smoke.

Reaper looked at him with the soulless gaze so many had come to fear. It didn’t scare him, not now he knew the man beneath it. The man was angry and distorted, a self-made monster, but he was still something like the man Jack had once known. He was still the good man he had known twenty years ago, underneath the blood and guts and the plumes of wraith like smoke.

“It did.” Still there wasn’t a move to take the bone white mask from his face. Reaper didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing the damage. Jack chuckled bitterly, his teeth bared before he picked up his visor. Turning his back to the Reaper, he looked at the damage to his visor before glancing at the blood matted on the knuckles of his gloves.  
“Don’t turn your back on me, Morrison.” Reaper growled, smoke catching the blood dripping from his chin.  
Jack turned around with another snarl, “You don’t get to tell me what to do anymore, Reyes.” but his face softened as he looked at slow healing form of the man in front of him. 

Reaper took three shuddering breaths before he replied, “I’m not him anymore.” He spat, his clawed hands curling into fists.  
“You can’t change who you are. You’re still Gabriel Reyes whether you like it or not, no matter how badly you want to be a monster. You want to be your persona, but it doesn’t change who you are.” Jack stomped towards him, hearing the unearthly growl rumble from Gabriel’s chest as he poked him hard enough to shake his form.  
Reaper looked at him, hard and long, before he reached into his hood, “Fine. You can decide whether I’m the man you used to know.” His claws curled under the jaw of the mask and clicked it upwards. It hissed and clicked out of place before it was pulled away, gripped in one large clawed hand. 

Ana had told him what was under the mask. It was still Gabriel, but twisted. Scarred with the little old scars over his eye and cheek that Jack remembered, but with his skin reforming and disappearing. Gabriel let out a shuddering breath, his cheek blowing away to reveal muscle and sharp teeth. His nose was gone the next minute before it reformed and grew.   
“She did a number on you, huh?” Jack muttered, looking at Gabriel, taking in the grey that had streaked through his facial hair. It was messier, untidy and simply just trimmed. No style anymore. The hood was pushed back, revealing the hair he had tied back tightly, streaked with grey just the same as Jack’s, “I’m jealous that I went grey first.” 

The vicious look from Gabriel softened at the words. He was confused. The easy going remarks. But somehow, he could see this no other way. The anger burned low and he looked down at the floor where his shotguns were discarded. He could easily pick them up and splatter Jack’s head against the cement, and he didn’t know why he couldn’t.

“Yeah, well, you were the one with the stress.” He cringed as he said it, playing into Jack’s stupid game of quips. His eyes flared with black as his red eyes looked over at Jack and back at his shotguns again.   
“We both had our fair share...You with...You know.”  
“Your blindness to the sabotage taking place underneath your nose?”   
Jack grit his teeth, “I had my reasons Gabriel. You had nothing but circumstantial evidence.”  
“And you still deigned to fucking ignore me.” Gabriel seethed and squared his shoulders.  
“I did. But I didn’t do any of this. You were right, Gabriel, but don’t think I was the one that set off the explosives. We both know that wasn’t me.”

It was eerily silent. 

Gabriel knew he should kill him. Crack his head open and finally be free from the anger.

But, he also knew it was misplaced. 

Jack watched his face twist and reform before it disappeared again. He reached around his back and gently touched the implanted fields in his back. They kept him stable enough. His condition was a bi-product of his own foolish choices. Moira was a vicious snake, yet she was the only one stopping him from disappearing all together.

A little puppet on a fucking string. Just like Jack.

“Everything was a mistake. I would change it if I could, Gabe.”  
Gabriel recoiled at the name, his eyes flashing and his teeth gritted before he held Jack close, his claws clutching the leather of his jacket, “Don’t you use that name with me. You lost that privilege long ago.” He let him go just as quickly, “I know...I know what you would change. It doesn’t change what you did Jack.”  
“Don’t hold me accountable for it all.” Jack prompted, fists clenched, “You fucked up as well. This isn’t all my fault. You ran in like a fucking idiot again. You killed him-”   
Gabriel could have beaten Jack’s thick skull in. But he knew. He knew he was right. They were both at fault. 

“We...” He swallowed and held Jack’s blue gaze, “We both did stupid shit. Let me do this, Jack. Let me get to the bottom of what I started. They think...They think my conditioning worked. Moira’s experiments have basically nullified it all. I’m just between now. Not a man, not a monster, but someone who can do something.”

He dared to reach for Jack’s face. The stroked a claw over his jaw. He could see the pretty boy wonder again for a moment before the scars and grey hair appeared once more. They were old. Smoke bled from his arms as he pulled away.

“I’ll make them pay. You can try and stop me, if you want, but I’m sick of waiting for your word to do anything. I’m going to make them pay for what they did, and the lives they took.” Gabriel clipped his mask in place and blew a stream of smoke out from underneath it, rushing over his guns, collecting them before he curled into the air, “See you around, boy scout.” His voice echoed through the air before he vanished over the wall and out of sight.

Jack watched him go and shook his head, collecting his gun and clicking his biotic field, the warmth of the healing aura pouring over his aches and wounds.

“I wont let you kill anymore people, Gabriel. I won’t let you become the monster.” He promised into the night air.

**Author's Note:**

> Overwatch, it has been a long time....  
> I hope this little one shot was any good. I'm still trying to work out just how their dynamic would work again.
> 
> Catch me on tumblr at: sp00kworm
> 
> Thanks for reading.


End file.
